WalletHub says Cleveland's taking a grow-slow approach

Personal finance website WalletHub.com released a list of the fastest- and slowest-growing cities in America, and the results are not good for Cleveland.

The city ranked 497th out of 515 overall, and 64th — dead last — of large cities included in the ranking. WalletHub's ranking is based on a review of 15 statistical measures over seven years. The data set ranges from population growth to unemployment rate decrease to growth in regional GDP per capita.

Here's how Cleveland fares in some key areas, with the number 1 representing the fastest growth and 258 representing average growth:

Such museums "aren't new, but they've grown significantly in terms of the numbers in the last 10 years or so," Mac MacLellan, president of the central region at Northern Trust Wealth Management, tells The Times. "The interest in creating a private museum has increased as interest in art overall has increased. It runs from the very small to the very large. It's not as narrow a topic as you might think."

There are tax benefits to these arrangements, but they're often offset by the costs associated with building and maintaining a museum.

From the story:

After Fred Bidwell sold his advertising firm to WPP in 2010, he began to think seriously about opening a contemporary art museum for the collection that he and his wife, Laura, had amassed. As a result, the Bidwells bought a 1920s power plant on Cleveland's West Side, renovating and expanding the property to create Transformer Station.

Mr. Bidwell, 65, said the initial cost in 2013 was $2.5 million to $3 million — not including what the couple paid for the artwork — and that annual expenses were about $250,000. He said he knew that running the building and managing the museum and its exhibitions would be challenging, so he struck a deal with the Cleveland Museum of Art, where he is a trustee. The Bidwells makes their exhibition space available to the museum for half of the year.

"We were a little naïve about how much work this would be," Mr. Bidwell said. "When we lend our galleries to the Cleveland Museum of Art, we challenge them to do exhibitions that are more daring than they normally would."

Another consideration, experts say, is what becomes of a museum after its founder dies.

Bidwell tells The Times that in the case of Transformer Station, the building and the art would go to the Cleveland Museum of Art after 15 years.

"In 10 years or so, we can walk away and relax a little bit, and it will go on as a lasting institution," he says. "We did this because we're activist collectors and we like to work with artists, but we're not immortal."

WHAT MIGHT HAVE BEEN

There's an intriguing tidbit related to Beachwood-based DDR Corp. in this Reuters story about a company called Snow Park Capital Partners LP, which has built a stake in retail-focused real estate investment trust Cedar Realty Trust Inc. and is urging it to explore strategic options.

The news service, citing sources who requested anonymity, notes that talks between Snow Park, an activist hedge fund, and Cedar "are at an early stage, and it is unclear if Cedar will decide to conduct a strategic review or consider a challenge to the company's board, the sources said this week."

Earlier this year, Reuters reports, Cedar Realty "considered a sale to rival retail REIT" DDR, but it decided against a deal, the sources said.

DDR did not immediately respond to requests for comment, Reuters says. The Beachwood company's new CEO, David Lukes, has announced plans to streamline its organizational structure.